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Traversing Sexualities and Spaces

-Documenting
the Kriti Film Club February 2019 screening

Kriti Film Club organised the
screening of three short documentaries (I’m Not There, Zara Nazar Utha Ke Dekho
and Please Mind the Gap) under the event titled ‘Traversing Sexualities and
Spaces’ on 23rd January 2019 at India Habitat Centre, New Delhi. Produced
by PSBT, these films are a part of the Gender and Sexuality series. The evening
brought together approximately 150 people as audience.

I’m Not There,by AjitaBanerjie, explores the
relationship between migration and one’s gender, and views migration as a
journey that allows one to leave behind a self that they don’t identify with
and move to a new space, seeking a new identity. Set primarily in Bangalore,
the film focuses on the lives of gender queer individuals who have migrated to
the big city with the hope to build a new future.

Zara NazarUthaKeDekho, by
Anindya Shankar Das, juxtaposes personal narratives of cruising from the LGBTQ
community, against diverse visuals of Indian public spaces, revealing different
facets and complexities of urban cruising. Shot at various locations in
metropolitan cities of India, the film showcases the diverse ways through which
queer people claim the public sphere under the shadows of the state.

Please Mind the Gap, by Mitali Trivedi and Gagandeep
Singh, tries to document the life of Anshuman, a transman, as he narrates his
journey and how the Delhi metro has played a huge part in it. As the stations
pass, we begin to look at the metro space from his perspective. His story is one
of reclaiming public spaces and one’s own self.

Kriti team’s founder, Ms.
Aanchal Kapur welcomed everyone to Kriti Film Club’s first screening of 2019 on
a winter evening in New Delhi. She also announced the release of ‘Our Diary
2019’ which documents people's movements in its 20th edition. Aanchal also
welcomed the film makers of two of the documentaries and the PSBT team to the
screening.

Post the screening of all three
documentaries, the film makers (AjitaBanerjie, Mitali Trivedi and Gagandeep
Singh) and Anshuman (the protagonist of Please Mind The Gap) were invited for
an interactive
session with the audience.

Arsh Bahl, one of the audience
members, commented on Please Mind the Gap, “I
love the simplicity of the film.” He commended the candidness of the
character displayed in the film and applauded the film makers for the
filmmaking method they used to capture different aspects of the Delhi Metro.

Saransh Bisht, a Kriti team volunteer
expressed his desire to understand the difficulties (if any) that the non-queer
directors may have faced while making films about queer individuals. In
response to this, Ajita Banerjie stated that she did not face many hardships as she
knew her film’s characters beforehand. She added that her focus in the film was
primarily on migration rather than queerness. Mitali Trivedi told the audience
that she and Gagandeep Singh met Anshuman a year before shooting the film and this
gave them almost the entire year in building a rapport with and knowing each
other. This level of comfort perhaps aided the making of their film.

Another audience member posed a
question about the practice of absenteeism of directors from the film frame,
adopted by almost every director. Gagandeep comically remarked that he had sung
a song in the film. While responding to this question, Mitali and Ajita shared
that they did not want to interrupt the narratives of the queer individuals in
the films. Their film making process aimed at having the characters build their
own narratives. Gagandeep added, “We
could not have shot inside the Delhi Metro and therefore our focus was to
capture Anshuman’s story only.”

A member of the audience remarked
that there is an urgent need for queer-friendly public spaces. The acceptance
can come only when the general public is sensitized about queer issues. It is
also required that we move beyond gender binaries—so that public infrastructure
and spaces accommodate non-binary populations without bias..

Commenting on the story built by the
main character, Anshuman, in the film ‘Please Mind the Gap’, one of the members
in the audience said that she loved the film because Anshuman was visible and
was able to narrate his life in an unbiased and transparent way. She auded his
courage and boldness.

A question was raised about the
personal life of Anshuman, to which he responded: “I realized at the age of five or six, that I was born in the wrong
body. When puberty hit me, things started to bother me. Since I was in a small
town, I didn’t know much about people like me. When I moved to Delhi, I got to
know about the term ‘Trans’ and my journey as a transman began from that day
onwards. I did not know about the binders before. Frequenting women washrooms
was embarrassing for me. The guards would often question my sex. When I got to
know about the existence of cubicles in men’s washrooms, I started using them
instead. The film was the result of a dialogue between me and the directors. We
had put in multiple thoughts before deciding what parts of my journey would be
shared on-screen. I think there are many more films that can be made on my
journey, as there is more about me.”

On being asked about the lack of
narratives of queer identities/individuals from rural areas in the films, Ajita
replied that one of the protagonists in her ‘I’m not There’ comes from a small
town. Ajitha tried to focus on rural to urban migration as well, and made an
attempt to capture the changing perspectives regarding migration.

Another audience member asked the
directors about the various ways in which queer characters can be sensibly
represented in mainstream cinema. Ajita stated that because of earlier laws,
many film directors were apprehensive about working on this issue. However, independent
media does take up queer issues every now and then. “The question of representation is related to law and societal
acceptance”, she remarked. Gagandeep said that times are changing—terms such
as gay and lesbian are now available in the public domain, so perhaps mainstream
directors would soon make films on these issues too.

An audience member wished to know
more about cruising and pointed at the lack of such spaces for queer women. In
response to the question posed, Ridhima from the PSBT team described cruising
as an activity in which queer men indulge in order to socialize with other
queer men at a specific designated place. She also told the audiences about the
few narratives of queer women mentioned in the film. She acknowleged the dearth
of such public spaces for queer women.

AanchalKapur also commented on the documentaries
screened. On the film ‘I’m not there’, she said that the director had
beautifully explored the concept of migration-not just the physical migration
but also the impact it had on the psyche of the migrants and how they
negotiated their sexual identities. On ‘Nazar Utha ke Dekho’ she said that the
film, tried to dissect masculinities in many ways. While talking about ‘Please
Mind the Gap’ she narrated her time in London years ago and the experience of
boarding the metro for the first time. Aanchal commented that this film managed
to open up a discourse on public spaces. She expressed concern over gender
discriminatory infrastructure in the capital city, while also addressing her
experience of observing the changing use of public spaces and a gradual shift
towards inclusivity in the city of Mumbai.

The common binding force of all
three films was the ways in which queer individuals are reclaiming public
spaces. The need and importance of inclusivity in urban planning was showcased
as a major concern in all three films. Marginalisation in urban spaces is one
of the multiple modes of social and spatial oppression that queer individuals
confront daily. Even though post-liberalisation India has witnessed a
tremendous change in societal norms, queer individuals still spend their lives
under a wrap. The documentaries revealed the dilemmas faced by queer
individuals across spectrums.

The films also brought forth the
question of gender. The multiple
characters shown in the films which don’t fall within the socially accepted
heteronormative system shatter our imagination of historically rigid categories
of a man and a woman. They attempt to widen our idea of gender and make an
appeal to the larger public to give queer individuals equal representation in
public policies.

The
Kriti team volunteers for the event included Saransh Bisht, Himanshu Chugh,
Charu Bahal and Divakar Yadav.

THE TIGER WHO CROSSED THE LINE45mins/English with subtitles/201612th May 20177 PMGulmohar Hall, India Habitat Centre, New Delhi As
the world sleeps, in the dead of night, ghost like figures of big cats
roam the fringes of the villages and the cities. They are the tigers who
live OUTSIDE the tiger reserves. And they are in trouble.
While
some of the tiger reserves are now safe heaven for the tigers, the
outsides are the minefields. The rising population inside many reserves
has had a paradoxical effect. The excess tigers have spilled out of the
reserves into the adjoining forested lands. With increasing development
pressures on the forest corridors outside, the spilling out tigers are coming
into constant conflict with humans with alarming consequences for both.
The myopic vision of the tiger planers in India has begun to bite back.
The
director traversed India, in search of these beleaguered tigers. Made
over 4 years, the film reports from distant corners of India, the
man…

Kriti Film Club invites you for the Independence Day month screening with two important Documentaries 'Daslakhiya' and 'The Hunt'4th August, 7 PMGulmohar Hall, India Habitat Center,Lodhi Road, New Delhi110003

______Screening 1______

Daslakhiya

Director: Rishika Namdev

Producer: Vineeth Menon 30 mins

Fences
are often built to create boundaries, to determine ownership and to
create a partition. One of such fences has been built in Kanha National
Park of India, where a primitive tribe has been deprived of their basic
forest rights. This documentary reveals the aftermath of eviction of the
BaigaTribe from Kanha National Park.

About the film: Padmashri Shovana Narayan brought classical dance into the lives of ordinary people, through over six decades of devotion to her art. As a bureaucrat, guru, researcher, scholar, wife and mother, she has delighted in going against the grain, and living authentically, with an air of purpose that is at once resolute and gentle. The Film brings to the fore the deeply reflective, generous and sensitive artist that lies behind the vivacious public image.

About the film maker: Aparna Sanyal is a filmmaker and producer based in Delhi, who has worked extensively on documentaries and TV shows, for channels like Discovery, History, National Geographic, Times Now, Headlines Today, CNN and the BBC. Recognised by the British Council for Creative Ent…

Kriti Film Club invites you to come celebrate Wildlife Week with the screening of

Durrell’s Underhogs Directed by Daniel Craven (45 mins/ 2017/ English)#ShotinIndia on 8 October 2017 at 7 pm Gulmohar Hall India Habitat Centre, Lodhi Road New Delhi 110003 About
the Film: This film is about the critically endangered Pygmy Hog and
the relentless efforts, initiated by the legendary author and pioneer of
conservation- Gerald Durrell for saving it. Once ranging throughout the
Himalayan foothills of Nepal, Bhutan and India, the Pygmy hog was
thought to be extinct until they resurfaced through a chance encounter,
thus starting a chain of efforts by organizations like the Durrell
Wildlife Conservation Trust to revive their numbers.

The film
follows Daniel Craven’s journey, who’s an advocate of Gerald Durrell-
the legendary author and pioneer of conservation. His journey takes
us through the ancient by lanes of Varanasi, on to Jamshedpur where
Gerald was born and spent the first fe…